In the oil drilling and production industry, chemical compositions, typically in the form of viscous aqueous fluids, are used in subterranean operations for such purposes as the development and completion of wellbores that penetrate subterranean formations, and the production of gaseous and liquid hydrocarbons from natural reservoirs. Viscous aqueous fluids are also used as carrier fluids. These viscous aqueous fluids can be used in operations that include perforating subterranean formations, fracturing subterranean formations, modifying the permeability of subterranean formations, or even controlling the production of sand or water from subterranean formations. Some compositions employed in these oilfield operations are commonly known as drilling compositions, completion compositions, work-over compositions, packer compositions, fracturing compositions, stimulation compositions, conformance or permeability control compositions, consolidation compositions, and the like. Such viscous aqueous fluids may be used as fracturing fluids, acidizing fluids, cementing mixture, and high-density completion fluids. Often such chemical compositions are additives, crosslinkers, or polymer compositions, and in the case of viscosifying agents, may be agents such as guar, guar-derived polymer compositions, cellulose, or cellulose-derived polymer compositions. These viscous fluids are often an aqueous solution of these chemical compositions. For example, the viscous aqueous fluid can be an aqueous solution of a dry powder polymer material.
The chemical compositions are typically transported by bulk transporters, bins and reservoirs to the field district or field location in order to be discharged, stored and/or pumped into a well. When the chemical composition is in a powder or dry form, the discharging process or transfer process of the powdered chemical composition requires the use of a transfer or discharge device, such as a transfer pump or a feeder, and may include the use of a metering device. The powdered chemical composition is also commonly discharged by gravity. In many of these discharge and transfer processes, the powdered chemical composition is aerated to facilitate removal from the bulk transporters, bins or reservoirs to another container, or a processing system (i.e., mixing system, conditioning system, storing system, etc.).
In order to aerate the powdered chemical compositions, a dry fluid, such as air having a moisture content less than a predetermined value, is often required to avoid solidification or agglomeration of the powdered chemical composition during the aeration process. The injected dry fluid for aeration is exhausted from the container and released into the atmosphere. The releasing of the exhausted aeration fluid into the atmosphere, however, may require filtering in order to remove particulates within the released fluid, such as for health or environmental reasons. The filtering of the fluid released from the container to health and environmental safe levels, can be very costly, especially for fine particles. Additionally, the releasing of the fluid into the atmosphere requires the use of an external source of the dry fluid to replace the fluid that is being released so that the aeration process can continue.
Prior art on the aeration of powders includes devices to inject the fluid inside the container. Patents dealing with the aeration devices themselves include U.S. Pat. No. 4,172,539 to Botkin for “AERATOR NOZZLE,” issued Oct. 30, 1979; U.S. Pat. No. 4,530,173 to Pausch et al. for “BIN FLUIDIZER,” issued Dec. 3, 1985; U.S. Pat. No. 4,662,543 to Solimar for “AERATION DEVICE FOR ASSISTING IN AERATION OF MATERIAL FROM CONTAINERS,” issued May 5, 1987; and U.S. Pat. No. 6,170,976 to Sisk for “PREASSEMBLED FLUIDIZING DEVICE HAVING EXPANSIVE AIR PASSAGE STIMULATING ENHANCED FLOW OF GRANULAR MATERIALS IN TANK TRAILERS AND CONTAINERS,” issued Jan. 9, 2001. These prior art patents assume dry fluid is readily available from an external source and are not concerned with limited supply of the dry fluid. These patents also do not teach the concern of exhausting the aerating fluid, other than going through an external filter and exhausting the cleaned fluid to the atmosphere. This implies a filter cleaning the fluid to health and environmental safe levels. As stated above, such filtering may be costly.
Thus, it would be advantageous to provide an apparatus for and a method of aerating the powdered chemical composition while avoiding or minimizing one or more of the drawbacks stated above. That is, it would be advantageous to avoid the necessity of providing costly filtering equipment to filter the aerating fluid. Furthermore, it would be advantageous to avoid and/or minimize the necessity of using an external source of a dry fluid to aerate the powdered chemical composition.